QR Codes in the Classroom: Increase Student Engagement

Gautam Garg |
April 6, 2015

If you are a teacher, you know that technology has now become an essential part of your classroom. SmartBoards, smart podiums, tablets, smartphones, and educational apps such as Quizlet are all student engagement strategies to enhance the learning experience. Another such growing strategy is the use of QR Codes in the classroom.

What is a QR Code?

A QR Code is a 2D barcode that can store information such as text, webpage links, links to social media pages, and event information.

How can QR Codes in the classroom increase student engagement?

There are two key characteristics in students these days – low attention span and love for technology. It is becoming exceedingly difficult for teachers to engage their students via traditional teaching methods. Students connect better when technology tools are used in the learning process.

There are a number of ways teachers are using QR Codes to make learning an interactive and engaging process for the students. Here are 4 popular ways you can use QR Codes in your classroom:

1. Organize a QR Code Scavenger Hunt

Divide your class into groups. Hide questions on a topic in QR Code and hide these across the school. Students need to find as many questions as possible and also figure out answers. Team with most answers wins. Here is a detailed post I wrote about QR Code Scavenger Hunts.

A QR Code Scavenger Hunt not only adds technology to the learning process but also uses gamification to make it fun for students.

2. Conceal questions or answers behind QR Codes in class exercises

You can put questions or answers behind QR Codes if you don’t want your students to immediately see what you have in store for them.

A Spanish teacher in Anderson School District Three, South Carolina is using QR Codes to improve the vocabulary of her students. She divides her class into pairs and places a number of QR Codes in from of them. Each QR Code contains a Spanish word which they must define for the class. This way students don’t know what word they will get. Not only is this exciting for students, they can’t cheat.

3. Add book reviews by students on Library books

This is a popular with school librarians and language teachers.

Students are asked to make text, audio, or video reports on selected books and a QR Code sticker is added to the book. Students, who issue the book next, can read reviews or see video reports made by their classmates.

4. Save paper and time by broadcasting material via QR Codes

If you are a teacher, you know how painful it is to photocopy class material for each and every student everyday. Why spend time photocopying, when you can simply show a QR Code on your smart board. The students can scan the QR Code with their tablets or smartphones and access the content.

A maths teacher in Marietta, Georgia is using QR Codes to ensure content privacy and student engagement. Through QR Codes, she distributes a different set of questions to students groups in her class based on their ability level.

5. Build a classroom audio library

Teachers can use QR Codes to create an audio library in the classroom to make reading easy and fun.

All the teacher has to do is:

Record themselves reading a book

Link the audio file to a QR Code

Print the encoded audio file on the book

Students can scan the QR Code and listen to these audio files while reading the text. Not only is this method cost effective, it is a great help to students with learning disabilities.

Create QR Codes for your class

Create, design, and manage QR Codes for your classroom to increase the engagement level of your students

Have you used QR Codes in your classroom? Share your experience with us in the comments section below.

Gautam Garg

Gautam Garg is a Co-founder of Scanova. He is a QR Code enthusiast and a big fan of inbound marketing, CRO, and usability. When taking a break, he likes to travel solo and eat spicy food. Follow him on Twitter @GGarg88